Poor Law

Poor Law

Old Poor Law
1. Elizabethan Poor Law
  1. 1601-1834
  2. Poor fell back on relief provided by the parish e.g. old, sick, disabled.
  3. relief was paid for by propertied classes through local taxes called poor rates - administered by parish overseers.
  4. Indoor relief and outdoor relief - deserving poor and able bodied poor
2. Act of Settlement
  1. 1701
  2. Anyone who was a Roman Catholic or married one became disqualified to inherit the throne - continue succession of protestant line.
3. Gilbert's Act
  1. 1782
  2. 'relief of the poor act' proposed by THOMAS GILBERT
  3. Counties were organised into parishes which could set up workhouses - aimed to be humane
4. Speenhamland/Allowance System
  1. 1795
  2. Speedhamland authorities decided to top up peoples wages with allowances based on the price of bread/size of the family.
  3. For families whose wages were low and could not afford to support their family.
  4. However, it allowed for farmers to pay low wages in the knowledge that pay would be supplemented by authorities -encouraged laziness.
1832 Royal Commission into Poor Law
1. Set up by the Whigs.
2. EDWIN CHADWICK was one of the leaders.
3. The 26 assistants knew what they were looking for and CHADWICK was set against poor law - there was little hope for it.
4. Long term concerns about poor law: cost, corruption, encouraging poverty, poor began seeing relief as their right.
5. Short term concerns about relief: Agricultural distress which turned violent - SWING RIOTS, fear of revolution due to French Revolution
6. 3000 places were visited - 1/5 of poor law districts - info collected and published in 13 volumes.
7. Evidence = unreliable - badly phrased leading questions BUT it was the first survey of its time - but poor law was never going to remain - predetermined.
8. The report was published in 1834 - criticised poor law for its corruption and claimed poor law was a root of poverty and radical change was needed to improve cost and efficiency
Pressures to Change Poor Law
1. Changes to Britain: expansion of industry, population growth, urbanisation, more living in the north and constitutional monarchy.
2. French Wars 1793-1815- curtailed import of corn, food shortages, high taxation, fear of revolutionary ideas
3. High food prices:Wheat: 1800-09 84s8d per quarter, 1810-19 91s5d per quarter, 1820-29 59s10d per quarter
4. Corn Laws: introduced by the Tories as they felt Britain needed to be self-sufficient - did not want cheap food to flood britain once the war had ended.
5. Post-war depression: problems with returning soldiers, effects of over expansion of staple industries e.g. coal, iron, increased unemployment - years 1817-19 = years of crisis.
6. Poor harvests = food shortages and higher food prices.
7. Radical Protests: Forces govt to introduce Six Acts, suspend Habeas Corpus, policy of repression.
Implementation of Poor Law
1. PLAA did not lead to immediate establishment of a new system
  1. Pace of change was slow across the country - authorities had to deal with a number of problems before they could implement the new law
    1. Local objections - Commissioners had to set up new unions of parishes - orginally planned to be equal size - around 30 parishes per workhouse - assistant commissioners were under pressure to get qucik results but interests of local landowners often prevailed.
    2. Building new workhouses - often delay in this as building a new one required a majority of local board of guardians = slow process, although old workhouses could be altered
    3. Gilberts unions - Commissioners had to deal with workhouses previously set up under old acts e.g. Gilberts Act 1782 - often refused to be brought into the new system
    4. Select Vestries - set up under Sturges Bourne Act 1819 remained outside the control of new unions
    5. Imposing commissions authority - greatest, longest term problem, insufficient commissioners which had to cover large areas - impossible to give each unions their requisite 2 years visit
2. Somerset house
  1. Problems in the region were mirrored in this centre - it was impossible for underpaid and understaffed house to cope with the paperwork - this failing tended to be ignored meaning commission was less efficient than expected
3. Success?
  1. By 1840 = 14,000 Parishes incorporated into Poor Law Unions - 800 remained outside the system
  2. Rural south = outstanding success - by 1839 - 300 new workhouses been built.
4. Outdoor Relief
  1. Theoretically banned under PLLA - made new workhouses vital. Ban began everywhere by 1842 - 3/4 of the country banned from giving relief to the able bodied - it could only be given for parish work.
  2. 1842 = Labour Test Orders, 1844 = Outdoor Relief Prohibitory Orders, 1852 = Outdoor Relief Regulation Order
  3. By 1871 only 1 in 6 unions were operating under 1844 law - banning outdoor relief to able bodied
  4. This was one of the central planks of the new PLAA which was impossible to implement
Opposition to Poor Law
1. 1) Terror of the workhouse
  1. Became known as Bastilles - French for prison - they came to symbolise a harsh new authority where they were punished for their poverty
  2. The harsh conditions suggested poverty itself was a crime
2. Reasons for opposition: Hatred, fear, fear of wage cuts and centralisation took away control of local governments
  1. Conditions: deliberately designed to be repellent, new buildings designed miles away from home - unpleasant, threatening and foreboding rather than familiar and friendly like the old ones - helped to fuel rumours about the new poor law.
    1. Rumours - they have been built for the sole purpose of exterminating the poor. THOMAS MALTHUS "The Book of Murder"
    2. 1832 Anatomy Act - allowed workhouses to deliver bodies of deceased inmates to medical schools for dissection/experimentation
    3. Deserving poor: under the old poor law, officials made a distinction between those whose poverty was self-inflicted - hardworking people = fearful of being thrown with roughest of society inside workhouses
3. 2) Driving down wages: one of the claims was it forced labourers to take any form of employment no matter how badly paid to avoid the workhouse
  1. Confirmed by the Commission
  2. Northern Factory Towns: resistance more fierce - linked with TEN HOUR MOVEMENT.
    1. CHADWICK urged for it to introduced - but ignored. Commissioners tried to set up poor law in time of depression. a mob of 6/7000 people disrupted proceedings and smashed down the gates - threatening to pull down buildings and attacking guardians
    2. Todmordern - most determined resistance - area refused to build a workhouse until 1877
4. 3) Concerns about guardians: many operatives resisted to protect their existing powers - feared building costs would be prohibitive with excessive maintenance costs
  1. Local authorities believed that workhouses would be too small to cope with demand
  2. Rural rate payers realised outdoor relief would be cheaper
  3. Many also believed the new law would destroy the paternalistic bond between the rich and the poor - used as a means of social control
  4. Rural England - resistance often took form of riots and disorder - Anthem Workhouse May 1835
    1. Quelled by reading the Riot Act, swearing in front of constables and reinforcements from Police/Yeomanry
      1. These events did not result in blocking the new law - significant.

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